Wyoming and 45 other states and territories are being warned against keeping what the Trump administration calls "gender ideology" in their sex-education curricula — on the threat of losing federal money.
After receiving the news, a group of Wyoming Republican lawmakers accused the state Department of Health of “using federal sex ed dollars to push LGBTQ sexual role play in our public schools” and publicly asked Gov. Mark Gordon to explain the curriculum President Donald Trump’s administration is now demanding be removed.
Gordon’s office in a Wednesday response said the curriculum was chosen from materials approved by a prior federal administration — President Joe Biden — and that the state is not waging a social agenda but is being whiplashed from the expectations of one federal administration to the next.
The Letter …
Andrew Gradison, acting assistant secretary of the federal Administration for Children and Families (ACF), sent a letter dated Aug. 26 to Stefan Johansson, director of the Wyoming Department of Health.
The letter mistakenly calls Johannson, who is a man, by the prefix of “Ms.”
It notes that the ACF asked Wyoming for its current curricula and program materials relevant to the state’s Personal Responsibility Education Program (PREP) grants, “for a medical accuracy review in accordance with the Terms and Conditions of the grant.”
A footnote explains the accuracy review pertains to the state’s approach to teaching about biological sex.
Wyoming complied with that request in a timely fashion, the letter notes.
ACF found program and curriculum materials that fall outside the scope of the grant’s authorizing statute, the letter says.
The statute, U.S. Title 42, section 713, says that PREP-funded education should be age-appropriate and medically accurate.
It “includes no mention of gender ideology,” wrote Gradison, “which is both irrelevant to teaching abstinence and contraception and unrelated to any of the adult preparation subjects described (in the law).”
President Joe Biden’s administration had approved those curricula.
“However, the prior administration erred in allowing PREP grants to be used to teach students gender ideology because that approval exceeded the agency’s authority” as enacted by Congress, Gradison added.
Wyoming is now out of compliance with the federal agency, the letter says.
It orders Wyoming remove all content concerning “gender ideology” from its curricula and program materials by Oct. 27, and to send a copy of the modified materials to the ACF for approval.
Flagged As Problematic
According to the letter, the sections the ACF flagged as problematic contain language about the following:
• Asking others to “tell you their pronouns.”
• Noting that some people may identify as male, female, or transgender, and “there are many ways that youth can express their gender identity.”
• Saying “sometimes one gender is given more power or status than another."
• Saying “gender identity is unique for each person” and may not fit “the sex (a person was) assigned at birth."
• Instructing students to role-play “sexual pressure situations” with classmates of the same and different genders. “This may be awkward for teens who are sensitive to the suggestion of same-sex romance, for teens who identify as gay or lesbian, or for teens who are transgender or gender nonconforming,” the letter relates from the curriculum.
Freedom Caucus
The Wyoming Freedom Caucus, a group of republican state lawmakers who often legislate social issues, derided Gordon’s Department of Health in two social media posts this past week, while referencing Gradison’s letter.
“The WY Department of Health has been warned by the Trump Administration to remove woke gender ideology indoctrination from state-published sex ed curriculum for 7-12th graders,” wrote the group in an Aug. 28 post. The statement adds: “Governor Mark Gordon: What is going on in your Department of Health?”
A Tuesday post echoes that, asking “why is the WY Department of Health using federal sex ed dollars to push LGBTQ sexual role play in our public schools??”
The flagged language does not describe erotica-style sexual role play, but the acting out of “sexual pressure situations.”
‘This Is Just Political Opportunism’
Gordon’s spokesman Michael Pearlman did not mince words in a Wednesday phone interview.
He emphasized that 46 states and/or territories received these letters, because they’d all tapped Biden-approved curricula when living under the Biden administration’s PREP grant requirements.
“The Freedom Caucus is blowing this up as some sort of big thing, and it’s just an opportunistic attempt by them to — once again — paint the state government and the governor in a bad light,” said Pearlman.
Though the Wyoming Department of Health adopted the curriculum to stay in line with federal guidance, there was no requirement to teach it, it doesn’t reflect the agency’s intentions for kids, and the WDH is going to update the curriculum as the ACF requests, he said.
“These things happen with some regularity when federal requirements change,” said Pearlman. “The Freedom Caucus loves to take shots at the Department of Health. … This is just political opportunism, frankly.”
The Wyoming Department of Health confirmed Pearlman’s points generally.
Three school districts and one nonprofit organization currently participate in Wyoming’s PREP program, which is optional and not mandatory, the agency wrote in a Wednesday email to Cowboy State Daily from WDH Operations Manager Lindsay Mills.
Wyoming uses nationally-available sexual health curricula approved prior by the federal government, the email says, and “Wyoming does not have editorial input on specific language in any of the curricula that are purchased as an optional resource for communities.”
WDH intends to reach compliance with ACF, the emails says.
‘Frightening For Two Reasons’
Wyoming Freedom Caucus Chair and state Rep. Rachel Rodriguez-Williams, R-Cody, countered in a Wednesday text message.
For Gordon’s office to say it was simply following Biden’s rules “is frightening for two reasons,” she wrote. “First, Wyoming has no business forwarding Biden’s woke gender agenda on our children.”
“Second,” Rodriguez-Williams continued, “the Biden Admin’s guidelines clearly ran afoul of the statutory guidelines of the PREP program.”
The statutes underpinning the PREP program do not specifically ban the teaching of what the Trump administration calls “gender ideology.”
As Gradison noted, that law “includes no mention of gender ideology.” The Trump administration is saying that topic is outside the law’s scope.
Rodriguez-Williams concluded: “To label legitimate concern about forcing kids to play ‘sexual pressure’ events as ‘opportunism’ shows the Governor’s true colors.”
Clair McFarland can be reached at clair@cowboystatedaily.com.
